A Western Regional Graduate Program Participant

©2005 ABOR

Arid Lands Resource Sciences
Graduate Interdisciplinary Programs
1955 East Sixth Street
PO Box 210184
Tucson, Arizona 85719

Phone: 520.626-9111
Fax: 520.621-3816

The Faculty of Arid Lands Resource Sciences, consisting of more than 45 members, provides the multidisciplinary breadth necessary for teaching and mentoring students with a wide range of interests.

Archer, Steven R.

Professor, School of Renewable Natural Resources

Plant ecology and ecosystem sciences. Interdisciplinary research on dry-land plant community dynamics and succession, with an emphasis on grass-woody plant interactions in relation to soils, climate, disturbance, and land use.

Baro, Mamadou A.

Associate Professor, Anthropology

Participatory Development, Household Livelihood Security, Applied Anthropology, Land Tenure, Gender and International Development with special focus on Africa and the Caribbean, and Research Methodology.

Bechtel, Robert B.

Professor, Psychology; Renewable Natural Resources

Environmental, ecological and social psychology.

Bonine, Michael E.

Department Head, Near Eastern Studies

Professor, Near Eastern Studies; Geography & Regional Development

Near-east geography, urban and settlement geography, comparative urbanism.

Bradley, Michael D.

Associate Department Head, Hydrology & Water Resources

Associate Professor, Hydrology & Water Resources

Water resources policy & management.

Colby, Bonnie G.

Professor, Agricultural & Resource Economics; Hydrology & Water Resources

Resource economics, impacts of climate change on resource utilization and value of natural areas, hydrology and water resources.

Comrie, Andrew C.

Associate Vice President for Research

Dean, Graduate College

Director, Graduate Interdisciplinary Programs

Professor, Geography & Regional Development

Research focuses on climate science applications for the environment and society. I specialize in the geographic aspects of atmospheric environmental science issues with connections to the related natural and social sciences. The range of my work includes synoptic climatology, urban and regional air pollution, climate variability and change, climate and health, multivariate statistical climate analysis, and map-pattern recognition and classification techniques. I have ongoing research interests in summer and winter climate variability in the Southwest United States, climatological and human factors influencing air pollution at local and regional scales, links between climate and disease, climate and wildfire, and new techniques for mapping climate and air quality information. I pursue basic research in climate and its applications as well as decision-support and connections to policy.

The interdisciplinary nature of my research means that I work in collaboration with faculty members, postdoctoral researchers, graduate students and undergraduates from the department and from a variety of programs across campus. I run the Applied Climate for Environment and Society (ACES) lab, which is housed in the department and serves as home for my lab group. We have close connections to other units on campus including the Institute for the Study of Planet Earth. Research in the ACES lab is supported by numerous federal, state and local agencies..

Cory, Dennis C.

Professor, Agricultural & Resource Economics

Natural resource & environmental economics & policy.

Cox, David E.

Associate Vice President, Outreach

Executive Director, Continuing Education & Academic Outreach

Director, Educational Communications & Technologies

Bart Cardon Associate Dean for Academic Programs Endowed Chair

Vice Dean, Agriculture & Life Sciences

Professor, Agriculture Education

Assessment and evaluation of learning styles of adolescent and adult learners, with application to matching teaching modalities to a variety of learning styles, to enhance student competency attainment.

Cuello, Joel

Associate Professor, Agricultural & Biosystems Engineering; BIO5 Institute

Bioreactor design & secondary metabolite production.

Davis, Owen K.

Professor, Geological Sciences

The past ecology and climate of arid regions, studying the pollen and plant fossils preserved in the sediments of lakes, marshes, and caves.

deSteiguer, J. Edward

Professor, School of Renewable Natural Resources

1. "Linear Optimization Methods and National Forest Planning: Past Experiences, Future Directions." 2. "Economic Impacts of Ecosystem Management on the Beaver Creek and V Bar V Watersheds." 3. "Potential Applications of Multi-Objective Decision Methods to National Forest Planning." 4. "Use of the Analytic Hierarchy Process to Obtain Stakeholder Management Preferences: A Case Study on the Coronado National Forest." 5. " A Comparative Study of Economic Indicators of Local Community Timber Dependency: A Colorado Case Study."

Elliot, John “Jack” F.

Department Head, Agricultural Education

Professor, Department of Agricultural Education

Research in agricultural and environmental issues.

Ffolliott, Peter F.

Professor, School of Renewable Natural Resources; Dendochronology; Arid Lands

Development & testing of ecosystems simulation models.

Finan, Timothy J.

Director, Bureau of Applied Research & Anthropology

Professor, Anthropology

Applied anthropology, cultural and societal impacts of climate vulnerability, famine vulnerability and early warning.

 

Fish, Suzanne K.

Professor, Anthropology, Arizona State Museum

Ethnobotany, ethnobiology, archeology, ethnopharmacy, Hohokam Agriculture.

Fonseca, Jorge M.

Assistant Professor, Plant Sciences, Yuma Agricultural Center

Main goal is to look at the effects of pre- and postharvest variables on quality of vegetables. My programs will develop new information and alternative technologies for vegetable production, harvest, handling and fresh-cut processing. The ultimate goal is to aid the industry find economically feasible and environmentally safe practices and technologies that add value to the final product.

Gibson, Lay J.

Professor, Office of Arid Lands Studies; Geography & Regional Development

Economic and urban geography, economic development.

Gimblett, H. Randy

Professor, School of Renewable Natural Resources; Landscape Architecture

Spatial dynamic ecosystem modeling; geographic information systems, artificial intelligence in natural resource planning; human cognition and environmental perception; landscape simulation; dynamic recreation behavior; modeling and simulation software; distributed multi agent reasoning systems.

Guertin, Phillip D.

Professor, School of Renewable Natural Resources

Watershed hydrology & management; wetland/riparian.

Gunatilaka, Leslie

Director, Southwest Center for Natural Products Research & Commercialization

Professor, Office of Arid Land Studies; BIO5 Institute

Application of natural product chemistry to solve problems of human and animal health and agriculture.

Hiller, Joseph G.

Associate Director, Agricultural Experiment Station, CALS

Assistant Dean and Assistant Director, Native American Programs

Professor, Renewable Natural Resources; Arid Lands

Indian country issues, watershed management, water policy, and rangeland ecology.

Hirschboeck, Katherine L.

Associate Professor, Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research; Atmospheric Sciences; Climatology; Geography & Regional Development; Hydrolgy & Water Resource Sciences

Climatology, hydrology, climate variability & dendroclimatology.

Huete, Alfredo R.

Professor, Soil, Water & Environmental Science

Biophysical remote sensing, Soil, water & environmental science.

Hutchinson , Charles F.

Director, Office of Arid Land Studies

Professor, Office of Arid Land Studies; Geography

Physical geography of arid lands, development in arid lands, famine early warning, decision support systems, remote sensing.

Karpiscak, Martin

Associate Research Scientist, Office of Arid Land Studies

Human impacts on water quality and plant communities; impacts of plants on water quality and impacts of water of various quality on the growth and health of different plant species; constructed wetlands; residential water conservation.

Knight, Jim

Professor, Agricultural Education

Agricultural Education

Kurc, Shirley A.

Associate Professor, School of Renewable Natural Resources

The main objective of my research group is to characterize key aspects of vegetation that govern water, energy, and carbon cycling in water-limited ecosystems. Understanding these cycles is critical to the sustainability of our native ecosystems as we anticipate gradual and abrupt climatic and anthropogenic change. This understanding is fundamental as changes in our native ecosystems will undoubtedly have effects on the health of our watersheds and rivers. We use state of the art field, lab, and modeling techniques to achieve this objective. Additionally, this group utilizes the extensive opportunities for collaboration, extension, and outreach that differentiate both the University of Arizona and the School of Natural Resources as great research institutions.

Marsh, Stuart E.

Program Chair, Arid Lands Resource Sciences GIDP;
Professor, Office of Arid Land Studies; Geography & Regional Development;
Director, Arizona Remote Sensing Center

Environmental studies, land use/cover change, remote sensing and geographic information science.

McClaran, Mitchel P.

Director for Research, Santa Rita Experimental Range

Professor, School of Renewable Natural Resources

Rangeland plant ecology, rangeland policy, recreational packstock management.

Megdal, Sharon B.

Director, Water Resources Research Center

Professor, Agricultural and Resource Economics; Soil, Water & Environmental Science; Public Administration & Policy

State and regional water policy and management

 

Molnar, Istvan

Associate Professor, Office of Arid Land Studies; BIO5 Institute; Plant Sciences

Application of modern microbiology, microbiology genetics and genomics to drug discovery. Understanding and manipulating secondary metabolism for pharmaceutical, agricultural, and chemical industrial applications.

Genetic engineering of biocatalytic processes for the productions of new secondary metabolites. Targeted metabolic engineering for improved production of secondary metabolites.

Cloning, sequencing, heterologous expression, and engineering of genes and gene clusters in microbes.

Olsen, John W.

Department Head, Anthropology

Regents Professor, Anthropology

Old World prehistory, pre-industrial technology & Central/East Asian Culture.

Orr, Barron

Associate Professor, Office of Arid Land Studies; Renewable Natural Resources

Geospatial Cooperative Extension, adoption strategies, remote sensing and spatial analysis, applied anthropology.

Park, Thomas K.

Associate Professor, Anthropology ; Near Eastern Studies

Risk and land tenure in the Sahel as well as bureaucracy and responses to imperialism in 19 th century Morocco.

Quanrud, David M.

Assistant Research Scientist, Office of Arid Land Studies

Water reclamation and reuse; impacts of natural treatment systems on reclaimed water quality; fate of emerging contaminants, including endocrine disrupting compounds during treatment in natural systems; constructed wetlands for treatment of wastewater; residential water conservation utilizing "smart" irrigation control technology.

Ray, Dennis T.

University Distinguished Professor & Faculty Fellow, Plant Sciences; Arid Lands

Development of new crops for arid environments.

Robbins, Paul

Professor, Geography & Regional Development

Interests: Political ecology, pastoralism, American urban ecology, Rajasthan India & USA

Schiffer, Michael Brian

Fred A. Riecker Distinguished Professor, Anthropology

Behavioral archaeology, archaeological method and theory, experimental archaeology, technology and society, ceramic technology, and electrical technology.

Scott, Christopher

Assistant Professor, Geography & Regional Development

Works on human forcing of global environmental change from the dual perspectives of policy-relevant interdisciplinary scholarship and social action. The focus of my research is on river basin hydrology and water resources decision-making, particularly in the U.S.-Mexico and South Asia (India, Nepal) contexts. Areas of interest include urban growth and water reuse, human-environment tradeoffs and their water scarcity and quality implications, and the role of land use (both irrigation and urban development) in mitigating water scarcity and water quality impacts in semi-arid regions.

Silvertooth, Jeffrey C.

Department Head, Soil, Water & Environmental Science

Professor, Soil, Water & Environmental Science; Plant Sciences

Development of new crop production management strategies; optimization of soil-plant system agronomically and economically, with full consideration of the short- and long-term impact of inputs environmentally.

Slack, Donald C.

Department Head, Agriculture & Biosystems Engineering

Cecil Miller Families Dean's Chair for Excellence

Professor, Agriculture & Biosystems Engineering; Watershed Management

Extension of knowledge about economic management of irrigated farms.

Smith, Steven E.

Associate Professor, Plant Sciences; Natural Resources

Plant breeding for stressful environments.

Stoffle, Richard W.

Professor, Anthropology

Cultural anthropology, social impact assessment, developmental anthropology, Native Americans, Caribbean industrial anthropology, fisheries, Ethnobotany; satellite imagery.

Swetnam, Thomas W.

Director, Lab of Tree-Ring Research

Professor, Geography & Regional Development; Dendochronology

Associate Professor, Ecology & Evolutionary Biology; Watershed Management

 

Forest/woodland ecosystem dynamics, disturbances & climate interactions.

Thompson, Thomas L.

Professor & Extension Specialist, Soil, Water & Environmental Science

Efficient water & fertilizer management in irrigated crops.

van Leeuwen, Willem

Assistant Professor, Office of Arid Lands Studies; Geography & Regional Development

 The most exciting research projects I am pursuing are multi-disciplinary in nature. My main research interests lie in understanding soil and vegetation ecosystem dynamics and how they respond to climate and human interactions. In the southwestern United States, drought, wildfire and monsoon rainfall events can have a devastating impact on the sustainable use of natural resources. As such, understanding ecosystems responses to and the effects of wildfire, water erosion and management activities are foci of my research interests. Current research projects revolve around Decision Support Systems and the integration of remotely sensed products in Geographic Information Systems in order to monitor natural resources, vegetation dynamics, post-wildfire effects, and land degradation through time and across landscapes.

Varady, Robert G.

Deputy Director, Udall Center

Director, Environmental Programs

Professor, Environmental Policy

Environmental policy; environmental history.

Washburne, James C.

Associate Director, Hydrology & Water Resources

Adjunct Assistant Professor, Hydrology & Water Resources

Basin scale hydrology/runoff using remotely sensed data; land surface Parameterization in mesoscale; assimilation of soil moisture into hydrologic models; applying emerging technologies to distributed hydrologic modeling..

Yetman, David A.

Research Social Scientist, Southwest Studies Center

Ecological relationships of indigenous people & their lands, rural development & land tenure & use in Sonora.

Yool, Stephen R.

Associate Professor, Geography & Regional Development

Biogeography, remote sensing, GIS, spatial analysis.